Ted Baillieu Doesn't Care About Bike People

Bicycle Victoria bring us the low down on the impact of the new Victorian State Budget on cyclists. The quick version is that there are zero dollars doing toward bike infrastructure. Clearly "in tough economic times" (I've read that a few hundreds times in the last few weeks, odd since Australia is experiencing one of its largest ever economic booms thanks to mining) we need to build enormous underground tunnels for cars instead.

Basically the consistent growth in funding for cycling over the last few years has been entirely reversed. Bicycle Victoria also notes:

The one year shutdown of the bike infrastructure program rips more than $20 million away from bike facilities investment.

While this will be a massive loss for bike riders, it is totally insignificant in the context of the $41 billion infrastructure budget.

And as every study shows, money invested in bikes actually reduces the burden on the budget and taxpayers. So rather than saving money, the government's decision is costing us money.